


Hold On

by Walkinrobe



Series: Heartbreak Series [1]
Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-06
Updated: 2019-11-06
Packaged: 2021-01-24 03:59:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21331921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Walkinrobe/pseuds/Walkinrobe
Summary: Sometimes you can't fix a broken heart
Relationships: Scott Moir/Tessa Virtue
Series: Heartbreak Series [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1541875
Comments: 87
Kudos: 202





	Hold On

**Author's Note:**

> This is a one shot, totally unrelated to my other works.
> 
> I gave myself challenge, to write a fic that included every line from Chord Overstreet's song 'Hold On'.
> 
> I failed. I couldn't make it happen. But I got about half way there.
> 
> Why Chord Overstreet? My daughter plays the song. A lot.
> 
> This fic talks about the ICU, pregnancy loss and heart conditions.
> 
> Thanks to Rook, LPM and Cat for being my test audience.

The way he speaks to her is heartbreakingly sweet. His tone of voice, his inflection, his words - always full of love and kindness. 

‘Hey, Birdie’. 

It’s the way the man greets the woman every time he walks back into the room. He picks up her hand, delicately running his thumb over her fingers before lowering his head to kiss the skin where her thumb meets her wrist. 

Every time. 

She knows who they are - the female patient and her constant visitor. Knowing who they are makes their situation desperately sad. They are famous and admired and talented. And the nature of their relationship has always been a little mysterious.

But not inside this room.

‘I’m missing you, Birdie’. 

That’s the next thing he says to the woman. Just before he kisses her forehead.

Every time. 

*

The ICU demands one on one nursing. The woman is her sole charge. It’s day four of a five-day block of night shifts.

The woman was brought in early afternoon three days ago. Rushed by ambulance. She is heavily sedated, on a ventilator. 

Her condition steadily deteriorating. Her prognosis is unclear.

She needs a new heart.

The woman’s bed is tucked in an alcove, offering a little more privacy than other beds. Monitors and tubes and tape obscure her identity. 

But the man is still recognisable. 

*

The man has been here almost all the time. He talks to the woman. Constantly. Sits by the bed and talks like she is listening. 

And she is.

Somewhere, somehow, the woman knows the man is there. 

‘She’d want you to call her Tess,’ the man had said on the second day, him watching carefully as she’d flushed one of the woman’s IV lines.

‘And I’m Scott,’ he’d offered.

‘Hello Scott, I’m Rebecca,’ is all she’d said in return. 

*

The specialists have assembled to discuss the woman’s condition. She continues to deteriorate. She is fully dependent on the ventilator now, her lungs have lost the ability to function by themselves.

The man has questions the doctors cannot answer. How and why? What happens next? When will they wake her up? When will she go home? 

She knows the response to the last question.

The man will not like the answer.

The ICU has a strict two-visitor policy. The man and the doctors decide to move to the meeting room down the hall, so the woman’s and the man’s families can join the discussion. It’s 10pm but the families have gathered to listen, to hear the information first hand and support the man. 

‘Back in a sec, Birdie,’ he smiles at her.

He kisses her hair before he leaves.

Every time. 

*

The man comes back distraught.

‘Hey, Birdie,’ he takes her hand.

He stifles a sob.

‘I can’t imagine a world with you gone’.

*

Just before midnight the man interrupts her work.

‘Excuse me, Rebecca, is it possible for me to lay down next to Tess? To climb into bed with her?’

The man looks so bereft. Devastated. She wants to give him the answer he needs.

‘I wish you could,’ is all she says in return.

*

The woman’s mother and sister come in at 1am. They sit, holding the woman’s hands and talk to her about the past. 

They talk to her about the man. How he’s doing OK, how they sent him home with his family for a meal and shower. 

They talk to her about the future. How she is needed and loved and that it’s only four weeks until the big day. She needs to get better.

She tries to tune out the mother’s anguish and the sister’s anger. 

‘Congenital fucking heart defect. Since when? How the hell is this only presenting itself now?’ the sister spits.

‘It has, Jordan. It just has. We’re simply going to deal with it. For Tess,’ answers the mother.

‘I don’t understand. She’s fit as fuck. Her heart can’t be broken’.

But it is. 

*

The man comes back at 2:30am. His hair is wet and his clothes are different.

He arrives with his brother. 

‘Hey Birdie,’ he sighs, ‘I’m missing you’.

The man and his brother talk quietly while the man strokes the woman’s arm. It’s a slow, firm caress from her elbow to her wrist. Even now and again he stops to kiss to soft skin inside her upper arm.

She’s discreetly checking the woman’s urine output when she notices the blanket is tinged with pink. She glances underneath the covers to find the woman laying in a dinner-plate sized pool of blood.

‘Scott, could I speak with you a moment?’ she asks the man.

The man looks to his brother.

‘It’s all good, I’ll take a bathroom break,’ the brother responds, patting the man on his shoulder.

‘Is everything OK?’ the man asks. Exhausted.

‘Is there any possibility that Tess could be pregnant?’ she slowly enquires, her eyes looking carefully for his reaction. 

‘I don’t... I... she didn’t...I’ve been away for two weeks... we...’

Before she can stop him the man quickly steps towards the bed and looks underneath the covers, confronted with the stark, blood soaked sheets. 

‘Fuck,’ the man whispers, pushing the heels of his hands to his eyes, ‘Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. We have been trying the past few months. If Tess is pregnant it’s very early. Is that... is she… is she miscarrying?’

‘I think so,’ is all she says in return.

*

They arrange for the woman’s blood and urine samples, the ones they sent down to the pathology lab earlier in the day, to be tested. They send fresh samples too.

The results are conclusive.

The woman is no longer pregnant. 

While she and another nurse work quickly to change the woman’s bed sheets she overhears snippets of a conversation, the man talking to his brother.

‘... how is this... fuck me Charlie... a nightmare I can’t escape from... ’

He’s not wrong.

*

The ICU is full. An industrial fire has resulted in four new admissions - a badly burned worker and three fire fighters with significant smoke inhalation injuries. 

There is a productive hum throughout the ICU, she puts her head down and focuses on her work, but can still hear the man talking softly to his brother. 

As she comes to the head of the bed to double check the leads to the ventilator the man starts to quietly cry. Silent tears. Ragged breaths.

‘Can you get Ma to come in and sit with me?’ he asks his brother.

‘Yup buddy, of course. Straight away,’ the brother answers, pulling him into a solid hug. ‘This situation is fifty shades of fucked up. I love you guys’.

The man lifts his head off his brother’s shoulder.

‘Fifty shades of fucked up?’ the man echoes with a raised eyebrow.

‘Probably could have chosen my words a bit better,’ the brother smirks.

*

Once the brother leaves the man stands up and looks at the woman’s face. He sweeps the back of his fingers high across her cheek, avoiding the line of tape that secures the endotracheal tube in place.

He stands silently for a minute.

Then his shoulder drop forward and he sobs. 

‘Is that what you wanted to tell me, Birdie?’ he shudders as he takes her hand again.

‘Were you going to tell me we’re having a baby?’

He sits and kisses her fingers. Each one individually. Kisses them like there’s all the time in the world.

There’s not.

‘Is that why you were so happy to have me home? Why you were being so playful, running across our bedroom and laughing when you locked yourself in the bathroom as I tried to grab you?’

The man takes a slow breath.

‘You we’re laying on the floor when I broke through the door,’ he whispers. ‘I heard the thud as you fell. I called and called to you but you didn’t answer. I busted the door in with my shoulder. It was much easier than I expected’.

Then he speaks so quietly she almost misses it.

‘Hold on, Birdie, I still need you. Please’.

*

Before the man’s mother arrives the doctors decide to move the woman to a private ICU room.

The look on the man’s face, as he comprehends why the woman is being moved, makes her feel nauseous. 

He speaks in a monotone.

‘She’s not coming home with me, is she?’ he asks the cardiologist. 

‘I’m sorry, I don’t think so,’ is all the doctor says in return.

*

Moving a ventilated patient is a significant undertaking. They diligently work through the intra-hospital transfer protocol and finally get the woman settled into her new room across from the entryway to the communal ICU ward. 

At 3:45am the man catches his mother as she strides past the door.

‘In here, Ma,’ the man calls.

‘What? Why have they moved Tess?’ the mother demands, eyes flitting between the man’s face and the woman’s bed. 

The man coughs. 

He covers his mouth but it’s no use, the vomit erupts through his fingers and spills onto the floor.

He is gasping for breath, on the verge of hyperventilation. 

‘They’ve brought her in here to die,’ he finally gets out.

*

She’s down on her hands and knees. Cleaning up the man’s vomit from the linoleum floor.

‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ he repeats over and over. 

‘It’s OK, you don’t have to apologise,’ she comforts. She’s seen a lot of vomit. She’s not bothered. 

The man is in shock. The reality of the woman’s situation consuming him body and soul. She witnessed this before. Many times over. The man’s mother escorts him into the en-suite bathroom, helping him wash his hands. 

She can hear the man and his mother talking.

‘It’s all happening too fast,’ the man whimpers, ‘I’m not ready, Ma. I can’t let her go’.

‘It’s OK to feel like that,’ his mother soothes.

‘I don’t wanna let her go. I don’t understand how we got here. I can’t be without her. I’ll be so lost if she leaves me alone’.

The man is crying as his mother leads him from the bathroom. She settles him in the chair beside the woman’s bed. He takes the woman’s hand and places his head on the bed next to her chest.

‘Hey Birdie’.

Every time.

*

‘We were going to have a baby,’ his muffled voice rings through the room.

‘What?’ his mother flicks up her head from where she was removing her phone from her handbag.

‘Tess was pregnant. She’s losing the baby. Miscarrying our baby’.

The man keeps his head on the bed. His mother comes across the room and envelops him in an embrace. The man dissolves into hard sobs. His mother seems kind and clever.

‘Oh, honey,’ she shudders, trying hard to keep a brave face for her son. 

She wants to tell the mother she’s doesn’t have to be brave. This room has seen many tears. 

‘I just... I just don’t want to be in this hospital anymore,’ the man moans, ‘I want our old life back’.

‘I know, I know,’ the man’s mother rubs circles into his back.

*

While man’s mother goes to telephone the families the man asks if he can have some time alone with the woman. 

‘I’ll be waiting just outside the door,’ she tells him. 

The woman’s vitals - particularly her blood pressure, oxygen saturation and pulse are incredibly low. They’ve exhausted the catalogue of drugs to support the woman’s heart. Short of a donor heart there is nothing left to do for her. 

The donor heart search has been fruitless. 

She sits outside the door, an iPad in her hand, the display replicating the screens from within the woman’s room. 

She tries to busy her mind, pulls out her phone to text her husband, an attempt to distract herself from overhearing the words spoken by the man.

It’s only partly successful.

‘Come back, Birdie. I still need you. Loving you, winning with you, fighting with you, doing everyday with you, working with you, the joy and the chaos, it’s been my whole life’.

A pause. 

‘I need... I... I want... to say so many things, but nothing seems like enough. Our families are going to descend upon us any minute. And I don’t want to share you right now’.

A pause.

‘I feel rushed, like I won’t do this right. I’m not ready to say goodbye. I don’t want to say goodbye. It feels like we only just got to the good part of our lives, eh?’

A pause.

‘Right... right now... this all feels... it feels... like the future we planned is just out of my fucking reach. I can see it, just there, waiting for us. A family and life together. And my heart hurts with anger and sadness and regret that we didn’t get married at Christmas like you wanted’.

A pause.

‘I love you so much. I know you know that. I know you love me so much, too'. 

A pause.

‘I’m going to miss all the spectacularly ordinary parts of our life. I’m going to miss sleeping in with you on Sunday mornings. I’m going to miss that ridiculous way you swipe your hand across the bathroom mirror when it’s steamed up. I’m going miss the way you always kneel down when you say hello to our nieces and nephews. I’m going miss kissing you in the afternoon sunshine on our back porch. I’m going to miss your cute as fuck winks and the way we talk through our teeth’.

A pause.

‘I’m going to miss dancing with you’.

A pause.

‘I’m going to miss having you naked in our bed’.

A pause.

‘I’m sorry our wedding is four weeks away. I want to see you in your dress. I want to give my speech. I’ve been dreaming of that first dance. Just us’.

A pause. 

‘I promise to love you my whole life’.

The woman’s heart rate becomes irregular. She turns to look into the room.

The man picks up her hand, delicately running his thumb over her fingers before lowering his head to kiss the skin where her thumb meets her wrist. 

Every time. 

*

The man’s and woman’s families gather. She’s seen this before, a bedside vigil, a sharing of memories. She hears morsels of reminiscing, laugh out loud family anecdotes and tears over events that will never eventuate. The woman is loved. And has loved. This is clear.

The fame and adoration and talent. It’s not enough to save her. 

As the woman’s heart slows she turns off the sound of the heart rate monitor. This isn’t the fucking movies. They don’t let anyone hear the brutal sound of a flat-line. 

The man sits in the chair by the woman’s bed, his father’s arms wrapped tightly around his body.

The man strokes the woman’s arm. It’s a slow, firm caress from her elbow to her wrist. Even now and again he stops to kiss to soft skin inside her upper arm.

When the woman’s heart stops beating the man looks up for confirmation. She gives him a small nod.

The man gives a strangled mewl.

‘Oh, Birdie’. 

*

Afterwards, when she’s removed the woman’s IV lines and breathing paraphernalia, she finally gets to see the woman’s unadorned face for the first time.

The man is there, he hasn’t left the woman’s side. 

The woman’s face is puffy from the steroids but she looks like herself. She looks tired but herself. Finally, she removes the tape that was fastening the woman’s eyes shut. As she steps back from the bed the man speaks.

‘Hey, Birdie,’ the man whispers ‘there you are’.

He reaches down and kisses her lips. Once, twice, three times. 

‘Can I?’ the man asks her.

‘Of course,’ is all she says in return.

As she leaves the room she’s see the man climb into bed with the woman. He gently lifts her upper body and slides his arm under her back cradling her to his chest. 

He breaks down into uncontrolled sobs, running his hand through her hair, covering every part of her face in delicate kisses. 

As she closes the door behind her she hears him softly speaking.

‘I just want to hear you say ‘Baby, let’s go home,’ he cries. 

‘Birdie… I just want to take you home’.

*

**Author's Note:**

> Are you sad?
> 
> Or was that just waaaaaaaaay too much?
> 
> Tell me!


End file.
